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Runic Confirms Steam Workshop Support for Torchlight 2

When Runic President Travis Baldree nonchalantly mentioned that Torchlight 2 will have Steam Workshop support at launch, I thought I must've missed something, because this terrific news was new to me. But a quick Googling reveals that no other site has mentioned it in their previews, so I guess that makes this a GameSpy exclusive: Torchlight 2 is now confirmed to have Steam Workshop support when it comes out on September 20th!

"There was no reason not to," said Baldree. Quite right -- after seeing Skyrim's already amazingly active modding community positively explode with new users after Workshop made installing mods a virtually idiot-proof, one-button process, I'm baffled whenever a developer tells me their game won't take advantage of it.

We already knew this, but it's relevant information: Baldree also confirmed that mod tools are coming, probably a few weeks after launch, and says that Runic plans to put some mod content of its own up there to get things started. (During our conversation he suggested he might put up a mod that adds cursed weapons back in, a feature that he loves but everyone else at Runic voted down.) He expects to see more fan-made armor sets and items in Torchlight 2 than in the first one because of changes Runic's made to the way they're sized to the different classes -- I'm very much looking forward to seeing what people come up with.

When I asked if there would be DLC, he said that anything Runic puts out will likely be freebies which will automatically download via Steam and simply appear the next time you play. "We want to do about one a month to remind people we're still around," he said, adding that these might include new set items or events. The idea of finding random surprises even after I've played dozens of hours makes Torchlight 2 even more appealing than it already is. And all of that for 20 measly dollars -- if I got even half of the 64 hours Steam says I played Torchlight for that money I'd consider Torchlight 2 a steal, but all indications (such as co-op) point to potential getting far more than that.